Various catalysts have been developed and put into practice for advantageously implementing industrial synthesis of a variety of organic compounds.
However, many organic compounds, particularly pharmaceutical compounds and natural organic compounds, are optically active, and it has been difficult to artificially synthesize these compounds.
Accordingly, it is quite important to develop novel catalysts useful for the synthesis of these kinds of organic compounds.
Although metallic compounds have been developed as catalysts (see non-patent document 1), recent use of such catalysts has shown a negative trend due to problems of toxicity and environmental impact.
While amine catalysts have been developed in recent years as substitutes for metallic catalysts (see non-patent document 2), these catalysts are only able to be used for limited syntheses. Accordingly, there is a desire for the development of catalysts capable of being used in wide range of syntheses.
Non-patent document 1: “Synthesis of organic compounds VI: organic synthesis using metals”, Jikken Kagaku Koza (Handbook of Chemical Experiments) (5th ed.), The Chemical Society of Japan, Maruzen, 2004, Vol. 18.
Non-patent document 2: Oriyama et al., (1999), “Development of catalytic asymmetric acylation of alcohols in the presence of a chiral 1,2-diamine”, Journal of Synthetic Organic Chemistry, 1999, 57 (7).